When I was twelve years old, I went to Girl
Scout camp for the first time. It was the longest I’d ever been away from my
family, the first time I’d really ever had to make friends for myself—I was a
shy kid, so I relied on my friends to introduce me to other people—and it was
probably the most terrifying thing I’ve ever done. To put that last statement
into perspective for you, I perform in musicals on a regular basis, I’m pretty
chill about giving speeches, I’ve flown across the Atlantic to a country where
English is not people’s native language, and I’ve gotten back on horses I’ve
fallen off of within fifteen minutes of the fall—and while those rank among
scary things I’ve done, I somehow consider camp the scariest. But it was
probably also one of the best decisions I’ve ever made; I made a ton of friends
and had some pretty cool adventures, and I got way more comfortable with myself
in that one week than I had in my entire life. With the exception of last year,
I’ve gone back to Girl Scout camp every year after that—it was so much fun that
I couldn’t imagine not spending yet another summer there. But this year,
as I was making my camp plans, my mother presented an important question for
me; aren’t you too old for camp?

I can’t deny that she’s got a lot of valid
reasons for asking. I was one of the oldest girls at the entire camp the
last time I was there, I’ve been one of the oldest in my cabin without fail every
single year, and I turned sixteen this year; that means there’s a
possibility that I could be older than some of the counselors. So when she
asked me if I was too old for camp, I had to stop a minute and really start
thinking about it; am I too old for Girl Scout camp?

My knee-jerk reaction was no. I could think of a
ton of reasons why any other girl my age would want to explore other things,
but surely none of those fit me: I was okay being the oldest in the
cabin, even the oldest at camp; I was okay being older than the counselors; I
didn’t find the activities boring or too young for me in the slightest. But
then my mother presented me with some other ideas to think about when I was
answering this question.

The first thing she wanted me to consider was
the opportunities I could find outside of camp. I am deeply involved with
theatre, and she suggested that I help my theatre troupe with some of their
summer camps for younger kids, so I could learn a little bit more about what
goes into putting together a show from the tech side. I’ve been researching places
where I can try out aerial silks, and she suggested that I explore that over
the summer as well. There’s also the various travel ideas my dad gets and
countless other things I could be doing; basically, even if I don’t do camp, I
have a lot of other things I could do over the summer.

She recommended that I think about the dynamic
between me and the counselors. I’m getting older—it’s distinctly possible that
I may reach a point where I’m the same age as or even older than some of the
counselors, and while that might be okay for me, it could be difficult for some
of them to be in charge of a girl that close to them in age, a problem that
would only be exacerbated as I got older.

She then asked me what’s kept drawing me to camp
all these years. This was pretty easy to answer: I like spending every single
waking minute outdoors, getting sunburnt and bug-bitten and rained on and
sweaty and dirty and just being out in nature; I like that camp pushes me out
of my comfort zone, bringing me to activities that I would never even consider
back in the everyday world; I like that there are no cliques at camp, no
history, no friends we’ve already made, just a bunch of people all in the same
situation who are ready to have fun; and I like that camp gives me a chance to
unplug and completely disconnect from the outside world for a while, giving me
a hard reset before the school year starts.

After we had this conversation, we had a harder
one; sooner or later, I’m going to age out of camp and I will eventually have
to find those opportunities elsewhere. If I want to do canoeing, I’ll have to
explore places to do that; if I want to spend every minute of every day
outside, I have to be responsible for it; if I want to hit the hard reset
button on my brain and completely unplug and ditch the entire world, I will
have to find some way of doing it that doesn’t involve camp. I’ve always been
aware that this day is coming, but it’s getting closer, and sooner or later I
do have to think about it whether I want to or not.

But then my mom suggested that I explore
becoming a counselor in the coming years. This is an option that I was
considering a while back, but kind of gave up on last year—I’m not good at
being always on, I overthink things a lot, and my patience isn’t always the
greatest—but she kind of rekindled a little bit of that hope in me; maybe my
freaky knowledge of how to get everywhere at camp and my love for giving tours
and supporting my younger cabin buddies can actually be useful someday.

The general takeaway I got from our conversation
was this; I don’t consider myself too old for camp as of this year. But when
that time does come, I have a lot of options; I might look at becoming a camp
counselor, I’m definitely going to explore the other things I can do outside of
camp, and I’m certainly not going to stop looking for the things that camp
brings me—I just have to look for them in other places. Kids always say that
when they grow up, they want to do X; when I grow up, I’m going to look for a
way to recreate camp outside of camp.

No comments
:

Post a Comment

Powered by Girl Scouts!

Blog Archive

Search This Blog

About the Lime Green Giraffe

The Lime Green Giraffe is a by-girls for-girls online publication of the Girl Scouts of Greater Atlanta. We publish two annual issues in August and February in addition to more frequent coverage of special Girl Scout events. Our content focuses on Girls, Info, Reports, Activities, Fun, Friends, and Excitement.